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JINN MAGAZINE

PACIFIC NEWS SERVICE

Issue No. 3.17

08/11/97 - 08/24/97

CONTENTS


* VOICES: First-Person Essays Linking the Private to the Public

    The Wild Blue Yawn -- Life as it Really is on Air Force One
    By Ted Gup
    Date: 08-11-97
    A new movie, featuring a grim-faced actor as president aboard Air Force One, has prompted a veteran of the genuine First Plane to reveal all about the experience. Hold on to your cocktail forks, this may be a smooth ride. Ted Gup is Visiting Professor at the University of Maryland's College of Journalism and a writer whose work has appeared in The Washington Post, Time, Smithsonian, National Geographic, Gentlemen's Quarterly, Newsweek, Mother Jones, and other publications.

    How Cops Become Criminals
    By Joe S. Loya
    Date: 08-21-97
    Prisoners note a curious change in the fresh-faced, often idealistic guards who first come to work in penitentiaries. After a certain amount of time, the guards begin to resemble -- often deliberately -- the inmates. The idea that the criminal could subvert the man of law is inconceivable to the guard, let alone the cop. Yet the process is critical, argues PNS associate editor Joe Loya, to answering the question posed by New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani as his city grapples with the torture of a detainee by police: how can cops behave criminally? Loya, a freelance writer in Los Angeles, is at work on a book about his experiences in prison.


* VECTORS: A Regular Column on the Ideas and Directions Behind Today's News

    A Look at the China That's Really There
    By Franz Schurmann
    Date: 08-12-97
    Recently, political pronouncements and editorial columns on China seem intent on demonizing the country as either an economic threat or a nascent Nazi regime. Both images are far from reality, according to PNS commentator Franz Schurmann. A professor emeritus of history and sociology at the University of California, Berkeley, where he was former head of the Center for Chinese Studies, Schurmann is the author of The Organization and Ideology of Communist China and co-editor of The China Reader, among other books, and a founding editor of Pacific News Service. He recently returned from his third extensive trip through China.


* THE AMERICAS: The Growing Enmeshment of the U.S. and Latin Worlds

    Election of Gay Legislator Marks Major Shift in Land of Machismo
    By Andrew Reding
    Date: 08-19-97
    The sweeping changes in Mexico's political landscape include a striking first: for the first time anywhere in Latin America, an avowed homosexual has won a seat in the country's legislature. In an overwhelmingly Catholic, largely conservative, and strongly male-oriented society, the election of Patria Jimenez, with the full backing of her party, may mark the dawn of a new era for Mexico's gay citizens. PNS associate editor Andrew Reding is senior fellow for hemispheric affairs at the World Policy Institute.


* MOVEMENTS: Strategies For Survival, Identity and Direction by People on the Margins

    A Brief History of Carnivals
    By Michael Blanding
    Date: 08-14-97
    Even in an era of megatheme parks and canned stay-at-home amusement, the carnival continues to draw healthy crowds. The secret of its drawing power may reflect both its essential Americanness and far older traditions. PNS correspondent Michael Blanding is a freelance journalist living in San Francisco.

    Where Misfits Fit In: On the Road With the Carnival
    By Lyn Duff
    Date: 08-14-97
    One sure sign of summer -- at county fairs and shopping malls, on empty lots at the edge of town -- is the carnival. For those who keep the glitter glittering, it's a job, and not a bad one, but has little to do with the stereotypes associated with the carny lifestyle. Lyn Duff is on the staff of YO! (Youth Outlook), a magazine by and about young people produced by Pacific News Service.

    Waiting for an Apology -- Human Fallout From Navy Blast Unresolved After 53 Years
    By Earl Ofari Hutchinson
    Date: 08-18-97
    Talk of an apology for past racial practices rings particularly hollow for black seamen wrongly convicted of mutiny in 1944. Despite compelling evidence that the conviction was based purely on their race, the U.S. Navy has refused to budge and only the President now has the right to act --a power he has not exercised. Earl Ofari Hutchinson is the author of "Beyond OJ: Race. Sex and Class Lessons for America." His e-mail address is <ehutchi344@aol.com>.

    Behind Bars -- Prisoners Embrace a "Military Theology" to Make Sense of a Brutal World
    By Andrew Gauldin
    Date: 08-22-97
    Highly publicized incidents of torture by police and guards on prisoners raise the question of how those sworn to protect and preserve the law wind up becoming criminals. (See PNS essay by Joe Loya, 8.21.97, slugged pns-criminal). Another key question is how prisoners keep their sanity in a brutal world. According to PNS commentator Andrew Gauldin, many embrace the same "military theology" used by the culture to brutalize them. Gauldin, a freelance writer, teaches conflict resolution in prisons and juvenile halls in New York and California.


* CIVIL CONFLICTS: Interpretive Reports on Ethnic, Religious, and Inter-National Conflicts Worldwide

    Some in Arab World Wonder -- Is U.S. Growing Bored with Mideast Peace Process?
    By Rami Khouri
    Date: 08-13-97
    Even if Dennis Ross has succeeded in convincing Yasser Arafat of the need to curb Palestinian terror against Israelis, his mission has only deepened the rut in which the peace making process is stuck, argues Arab commentator Rami Khouri. Writing from Washington rather than his home base of Amman, Jordan, what strikes Khouri is the relative nonchalance with which the U.S. now views the troubling triad of hard-line rhetoric, violence and ineffectual diplomacy.

    Death Penalty Monolith Begins to Crack
    By Michael Kroll
    Date: 08-20-97
    It has been twenty years since Gary Gilmore said "let's do it" to a Utah firing squad, in effect opening a new a era of the death penalty. While public support for the penalty remains high, a growing understanding of the reality of its application -- particularly where prosecutors conceal or remove vital information -- has some people changing their minds. Michael Kroll is an associate editor for PNS specializing in criminal justice issues.

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